Does it come from a movie? I only started hearing it a few years ago.
I have no idea where it first started, but when I was a little kid (nearly 40 years ago), Moms used that line constantly. If one of us kids spilled chocolate milk on the rug, or broke a drinking glass, our mothers would invariably shriek “Damn it, we just can’t have nice things in this house! You kids destroy everything!”
Mind you, it’s not as if we were using Waterford Crystal! More likely, we’d be using an old Flintstone jelly jar glass (remember those?). No matter! If we broke one, we’d break our mothers’ hearts!
I laugh at the cliche now, but my amusement is tempered by the realization that I now have a 3 month old son… and I’m SURE I’m going to catch myself using some of my Mom’s silliest lines, before long. (Will that be one of them? Surely not!)
Remember the old Flintsone jelly glasses? Hell I have the whole set!
I thought my mother made that up???
Spelling and grammer subject to change with out notice.
No, I can’t have nice things.
It was used in The Simpsons (by Lisa). This could explain it if you’ve only been hearing it for several years. Of course, people would have been saying this for a long time before it appeared on the show, and for all I know it’s a movie or TV reference I don’t get. According to this SNPP.com capsule, Lisa says ‘This is why I can’t have nice things’ when Homer gives beer to Linguo, the grammar robot, in episode CABF14, a parody of Run Lola Run. Note that the episode also makes the error of showing a cylinder of ether when ether is a liquid at room temperature and has to be vaporized for use in anesthesia.
Was that the cylinder of “inflammable” ether?
Paula Poundstone used to have a bit similar to what Astorian said about her mother guilting her with that phrase. It was on TV several times in one of her specials. That might be what is being referenced.